Thursday, August 31, 2006

Are FLDS LDS?

This comment was posted on one of my rants about the arrest of Warren Jeffs:

"I just wanted to point out to anyone who may read this blog. Mormons are not FLDS. FLDS are not Mormons. Its like saying the pope is protestant. They are a break off group."

This above statement is similar to the think the Babtist claim about the LDS. The Baptists say the LDS broke away from Christianity and that members of the "Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints" really aren't Christian. The LDS, of course, counter that they are the most Christian of all people because Christ speaks through the writing of Joseph Smith.

As for the FLDS, the "F" stands for "Fundalmental." Yes, there was a schism. In the schism the fundamentalists were the ones who continue to practice the religion as it was taught by the religion founders Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. The FLDS are the ideological heirs of Smith and Young and there is a apparently a great deal of interplay betweeen the LDS and FLDS with people suddenly adopting the FLDS stance when they get a chance at a second wife.

I don't like the FLDS. I can understand why the LDS don't want to be associated with the fundamental version of their religion. At the FLDS rally the other week, the children of the FLDS talked about all of the prejudice, ridicule and abuse they take from the LDS. I dislike these fundamentalist kooks, but, you know, the way a religion treats its fundamentalists is somewhat telling about the nature of the group. At this point in history, the fundamentalists are an obstacle for the power that the LDS heirarchy, so, the LDS treat people who've dedicated their entire existence to holding to the ideology of their religion as pariahs.

Personally, I think there are legitimate questions about whether or not a group can rise about its fundamentals. Fundamentals, after all, are the foundations. In the case of an orgnanization that claims that its fundamentals came inscribed on golden tablets directly from God, denying the fundamentals becomes even harder.

Of course, I also know people who've become LDS because they felt the system was pliable enough for people to rise about the foundations of their faith. I know many LDS who point with pride to the poor way that they treat their fundamentalists to show that they are a faith that can bend and flow with political change.

I am one of those who think it really is not that easy to over come the roots of one's belief systems. Just distancing oneself from the embarrassing aspects of a belief systems simply sets people up to falling back into the same traps.